A Madison Twp. man who was cleared of a theft charge can proceed with a lawsuit he filed against a Lackawanna County detective and former assistant district attorney, a federal judge ruled.
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With a potential strike looming less than one month away and both sides expressing desire to avoid that outcome, representatives from the Abington Heights School District and the Abington Heights Education Association
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OLYPHANT — Wallenpaupack girls soccer coach Alicia Sodano committed to it six months ago, but even then, the former University of Scranton star didn’t know if the timing was right for a Media Day for the Lackawanna League.
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Friends of Lackawanna on Tuesday celebrated Throop Borough Council’s decision to oppose Keystone Sanitary Landfill’s nearly 45-year expansion plan, while landfill officials didn’t expect it to make a major impact on the state’s review of the proposal.
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Its liabilities were more than three times its assets, causing it to be declared a severely distressed plan by the state.

Over the next eight years, the plan's financial health steadily improved. The deficit, once as high as $1 million, was reduced to $311,000 as of 2011. It's now listed as minimally distressed by the state and is within a few percentage points of escaping distressed status.

The fund is among five pension plans in Lackawanna County that saw a positive change in their distress level statuses between 2009 and 2011, according to data from Pennsylvania's Public Employee Retirement Commission. The others were the nonuniform plans in Dickson City, Roaring Brook Twp. and Throop and the police plan in Taylor.

The news is not all good for those communities, however, as other pension plans in four of the five municipalities continue to struggle. The police plans in Blakely, Dickson City and Throop were each moderately distressed in 2011, while Roaring Brook's police plan was severely distressed.

Municipal officials say they are continuing to work to shore up all their pension plans.

The progress they have made in some of their plans is testament that local officials can dig their towns out of the pension hole if they are willing to control benefits and make the needed financial commitment, said James McAneny, executive director of PERC.

"There is a lot of hope," Mr. McAneny said. "Fiscal discipline is number one. It really is the answer to all these things because (the lack of discipline) is largely what got us into the problem we're in."

In Blakely, Borough Manager Tom Wascura said borough officials have worked hard to restore the funds to financial health. The nonuniform fund, which improved its distress score from 29 in 2003 to 84 in 2011, benefitted from strong investment returns in 2010, and increased contributions from employees.

Employee contributions increased from $34,227 in 2009 to $48,802 in 2011, according to data from PERC. Those additions, coupled with a $168,000 positive investment return in 2010, increased the fund's assets by about $700,000 from 2009 to 2011. Liabilities in that same time frame increased by about $270,000.

"We've been trying to work on it year by year to build it up with sound, conservative investments, and by putting a little more money in every year," Mr. Wascura said.

Daniel Zeleniak, borough manager in Taylor, said he cannot pinpoint one specific development that helped the police pension plan to improve from minimally distressed in 2009 to not distressed in 2011. Records show the 2009 dip to distressed status was an anomaly for the plan, which had a surplus from 2003 to 2007.

One factor that likely helped all the plans was the stock market. Taylor, Dickson City, Throop and Roaring Brook each benefitted from strong investment returns in 2010 that helped boost assets. Taylor saw a positive return of $139,878, Dickson City, $104,930 and Throop, $78,603. Roaring Brook did not fare as well, seeing a $9,255 gain, but it was aided by a roughly $5,000 increase in state aid.

The additional assets helped reduce the funding deficit for each municipality from 2009 to 2011. Taylor's deficit fell from $354,878 in 2009 to $224,875 in 2011; Dickson City's deficit dropped from $735,756 to $564,514; Roaring Brook's deficit decreased from $36,849 to $16,090.

While they have made progress, officials say they know there is still work to do.

Officials in Throop, Dickson City and Roaring Brook Twp. each said they have committed to contributing additional money, beyond what's required by the state, to the funds to help them rebound.

In Throop, the state-mandated contribution, known as the minimum municipal obligation, for 2013 for both plans combined is $297,274, ï»¿but council members plan to pay an additional $100,000, said Councilman Tom Lukasewicz. ï»¿"We think within a period of seven to 10 years we should be able to fund the plan at 100 percent," he said.

Roaring Brook Twp. Supervisor Robert Farischon said officials there are focusing first on the police fund, which is severely distressed. Supervisors paid $15,000 more into the police fund than is required by the state this year, and have committed to doing that each year in the future.

And in Dickson City, Borough Manager Cesare Forconi said council opted to forgo a provision within Act 44, a state law governing pensions, that allows a municipality to legally reduce its MMO if a pension is financially distressed. Scranton officials have used that provision extensively.

Mr. Forconi said the borough's MMO for 2014 is $413,073, but it could legally reduce the payment to $356,242 under Act 44. Council members chose to pay the higher amount, he said, because they're committed to exiting distressed status as soon as possible.

"If you take that reduction it's going to come back at you later," Mr. Forconi said. "You're just pushing off the debt to further councils and creating a future burden on taxpayers."

Contact the writer: tbesecker@timesshamrock.com

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